Seaswept (Seabound Chronicles Book 2) (9 page)

Chapter 11—The
Mission

The aftermath of the
attack floated on the bazaar like a layer of oil.
Hawkers sorted through their wares and packed their belongings. There was
quick, subdued trade at some of the stalls. Others had already disappeared. No
one laughed at the Rusty Nail. People stared at each other with distrustful
eyes. Even the music from the day before was absent.

Esther, Zoe, and
Cally walked slowly through the aisles. Cally was skittish and seemed about to
take off like a seagull at every step. Dax had gone off to gather information
from Neal while the three girls returned to the bazaar. Zoe’s fingers kept
straying to her belt knife. Esther forced herself to stay calm, keeping her
steps even as she led the way. There was no need to push through crowds now.
Several ships had already sailed away this morning. If Judith had her way, the
Catalina
would depart soon too.

They found Rachel
fixing new locks on her boxes of nuts and bolts. She had already attached her
collection of cables to the partition of the stall, as if she thought someone
would run by and snatch them away.

Esther didn’t
waste any time. “Rachel, we need your help.”

“Glad to see you
made it through the night,” Rachel said. Her hair escaped from her braid in
tendrils like metal shavings, and she wore the same clothes as the day before.
“See any action? I know you aren’t afraid of a fight.”

“We had boarders
on the
Catalina
, but we’re okay. You
remember Cally, and this is my friend Zoe,” Esther said.
 

Rachel nodded at
them. “Were you armed?” she asked. “I thought the
Catalina
was one of the few peaceful ships left.”

“We got by with
some help,” Esther said, avoiding Zoe’s gaze. She had been quieter than normal
ever since the slip of her knife had resulted in a man’s death. It had clearly
affected her, even though he had been attacking them.

“I’m surprised
they bothered with you folks at all.”

“Me too. Were you
okay here?” Esther asked.

“I was home in
bed, but I heard the explosions.” Rachel reached back and took hold of her
iron-gray braid, kneading the plait as she spoke. It was something Esther had
never seen her do before. Rachel was very nervous.

“Luke came by to
check on me this morning,” Rachel continued. “He said some of the Harvesters
got into it with the Calderon thugs. It was bound to happen sometime. They
exchanged a few blows but didn’t make off with much of their metal stash. The
Harvesters guard it well.”

“I heard some oil
was stolen in the attack,” Zoe said.

Rachel continued
to knead her braid. “True, but I have a hard time believing the Calderon Group
would attack the
Amsterdam
for a
measly handful of oil barrels. My theory is it was a symbolic move. A
declaration of war. They’re saying even the
Amsterdam
isn’t safe. The Calderon Group can do whatever they want wherever they want.
Unless someone stands up to them, it looks like they’re right.”

“Will they?” Zoe
asked. “Stand up to them?”

“I don’t know. Of
course, I could be wrong.” Rachel tossed her braid over her shoulder and
straightened her back.

“I think they
wanted something else too,” Esther said. “I’m hoping you know someone who can
help us.”

The rain got heavier by the minute. It pooled on the decks and ran down
the slanted beams of the oil rig in rivers and waterfalls. The pattering
surrounded them, discouraging conversation. The remaining ships around the
Amsterdam
looked fuzzy—when they
were visible at all.

Esther found
Rachel’s son, Luke, playing dice with two other men on the deck of a cargo
ship. A suspended lifeboat protected them from the rain. The dice game wasn’t
as raucous or intense as the ones she had seen in the bazaar yesterday. Meager
piles of scrap metal sat in a puddle on the deck in front of the players. The
men looked away from the dice to scan their surroundings frequently. All three
stood when Esther and her friends approached.

“Hi there, ladies.
Fancy a game? If you got anything of value, that is,” said a thin man who
seemed to be made entirely of straight lines. He watched them suspiciously
despite his casual tone.

“I know what you
could play for,” said one of the younger men, elbowing his friend and
snickering. He had short, curly brown hair that looked like it was still
recovering from a military haircut, and he wore a green military-style jacket.
Esther recognized the leer on his tanned face.

“No, thanks,”
Esther said. “You’re a sore loser, Luke. Not worth the drama.”

“Do I know you?”
the young man said.

Confusion replaced
the leer, and Esther knew for sure he was the same boy who’d quickly become
contrite after a lecture about fighting from his mother, Rachel.

“What’s this?”
said the bony man. “Another lady friend you’re going to claim you don’t
remember?” He slapped Luke on the back.

“Pretty sure he
paid the last one to talk about the ‘great night’ she had with him,” said the
third man, a short, dark-haired fellow who was probably a year or two younger
than Luke and Esther. He had round features that gave him a babyish appearance.
He also wore a green jacket, though his was sewn with dozens of pockets.

Luke punched his
friend in the arm and ducked a retaliatory swing. He jumped behind the other
man and put him in a headlock, all while shooting glances back at Esther. Finally,
recognition lit his brown eyes.

“You come to the
bazaar sometimes!” he said.

Esther smiled. “I
buy parts from your mom.”

Luke smacked his
friend’s shoulder. “Knew it! Esther from the
Canberra
.”

“
Catalina
.”

“That’s what I
meant. What’s up? Looking for a crew to join?” Luke’s voice was relaxed and
good natured, even as he struggled to maintain the headlock on his buddy.

“The Harvesters
hire women?” Zoe asked.

Luke eyed Zoe up
and down. “Yeah, first mate on my ship’s a gal. Not as pretty as you, mind.”
Luke’s smile was all teeth against his tanned face.

His friend took
this opportunity to extract himself from the headlock.

“She’d open your
guts for saying so, though,” said the bony man. “She’s a cold, hard bitch.”

“Sounds like
someone we know,” Cally whispered to Esther.

“She rejected you
is all, Rawlins,” said the baby-faced young man. He jerked reflexively when the
bony man chucked his dice at him.

“Shut up, Cody,”
Rawlins snapped.

“We’re not looking
to join a crew,” Esther said. “We need help.”

“Yeah? What kind?”
Luke nudged Cody with his elbow, and Cody shoved him back.

“We’re going after
the Calderon Group,” Esther said.

The men grew
serious.

“Look, Esther,”
Luke said, “you don’t want to mess with the Calderon boys.”

“I think they
kidnapped one of our friends,” Esther said. “We have no choice. Can you give me
any information about them? I could also use a few men to help navigate our
patrol ship and possibly fight, if you’re game.” She wasn’t sure how she’d get
control of the
Lucinda
for the
mission, but she knew it would be stupid to go after David without a few people
who had faced the Calderon Group before. “There will be a reward for whoever
helps us.”

Zoe shifted beside
her.

“We’re not
mercenaries,” the bony man, Rawlins, said. “The Harvesters operate a legitimate
business. You’ve come to the wrong guys.”

“Yeah, but you’ve
also dealt with a lot of shit from the Calderon Group lately,” Esther said,
remembering the rumors from the bazaar. “Don’t tell me you’re not already talking
about going after them after last night’s attack.”

Luke and Cody
exchanged glances.

“I’d say you’re
fed up,” Esther said, “and you want to take action.”

“Those bastards
crossed a line when they attacked the
Amsterdam
,”
Luke grumbled.

She had thought
she could count on him. He grew up on the
Amsterdam
,
and the Harvesters needed it to facilitate the metal trade. They wouldn’t want
anyone to tamper with the Coalition. Though Esther would have thought the Calderon
Group needed to maintain good ties with the
Amsterdam
too, until now.

“Why don’t you
come with us then?” she said.

“They aren’t going
anywhere on that baby patrol ship,” said Rawlins, who clearly outranked Luke
and Cody. He fixed Esther with a hard stare. “Don’t think I can’t tell what
you’re doing. You’re trying to split our group, lure us away with a tale of a
damsel in distress. I can recognize a Calderon plot when I see one.”

Esther met his
eyes steadily. “You’re wrong,” she said. “We’re not rescuing a damsel. It’s a
man . . . a man who was trying to sell a game-changing technology. They nabbed
him for it.”

She had learned
enough from David to know she would need this trump card.

“What kind of
technology?”

“The kind that
would allow you to be entirely independent,” Esther said. “The kind that would
mean you’d never run out of fuel, never need to rely on trade with anyone, Calderon
scum included.” She tried to imitate David’s way of waving his arms around to
make a point, but it felt awkward. She hooked her fingers in her belt instead.

“How do we know
such a technology exists?” Rawlins asked.

Cally spoke up:
“Oh, we know because Es— ”

Esther stepped on
Cally’s toe to silence her.

“I’ve seen it
work,” Esther said. “The Calderon Group heard our man talking about it and must
have decided to get an aggressive jump on the bidding during the chaos last
night.”

She kept her foot
on top of Cally’s for an extra second, willing her not to speak.

Rawlins laughed,
wheezing in a humorless way. “If what you say is true, then it’s too late.
They’ll already have the technology.”

“Maybe, but you
won’t,” Esther said. “How much do you want to bet that the Calderon boys won’t
be selling anything? Instead, they’ll become the most powerful coalition on the
sea in one stroke. They won’t need to trade for fuel anymore, and you
Harvesters will be left behind. Why else would they risk cutting ties with the
Amsterdam Coalition
last night?”

It occurred to
Esther then that David’s idea of selling the technology exclusively would never
have worked. It would make one group far too powerful, leaving the rest of the
ships at their mercy. She wished she hadn’t gone along with his idea so
quickly. And now David was paying the price . . . if he was still alive.

“How do you know
Calderon has your inventor boy?” Rawlins asked. “He could have fallen into the
sea.” He smiled, showing teeth that were the yellowish gray of carp.

“I heard a man
talking,” Cally said. She paused as if she expected Esther to stomp on her foot
again and then continued tentatively. “He said they didn’t want to pay for the
system . . . that maybe they should just steal him. The man was super-scary,
and he had huge holes in his earlobes.”

Rawlins grimaced,
which made the skin stretch tighter across his bones. Luke uttered a string of
curse words, including a handful Esther hadn’t heard before.

“That’ll be
Burns,” Rawlins grunted. “When he’s around the
Amsterdam
, he acts like a quartermaster, but we have it on good
authority he’s one of the real leaders of the Calderon Group, maybe even the
top leader. If what you say is true, then Calderon definitely has your boy.”

“Will you help
us?” Esther asked.

Rawlins spit in
the rain pooling around their feet. “We’re going to have to take you to the
higher-ups for this.”

“I just thought a
few of you could—”

“We’re all under
contract with the Harvesters. If you want some of our men, you’ll have to take
it to the top.”

Esther felt like
the deck had dropped a few inches beneath her feet. She hadn’t wanted to make
this too complicated. They just needed a few men and some information before
they went after David in the
Lucinda
.
The last time she’d gone to ask “higher-ups” for help, it hadn’t ended well.
But the Harvesters were their best chance at finding out where the Calderon ship
might have taken him. They would know how the Calderon Group worked. She had no
choice.

“Lead the way.”
Esther tried to project confidence in her voice, like David would have, but she
felt the situation spinning further out of her control.

Luke and Rawlins
led the three women across the main deck of the cargo ship toward their own
vessel. They emerged from between a pair of rusty shipping containers on the
port side, where the Harvester ship was moored. It was a large trawler at least
twice as long as the
Lucinda
, the
kind of heavy seagoing vessel that would have been used for large-scale tuna
fishing in the old days. Like most of the ships that had managed to remain
seaworthy over the past sixteen years, it had undergone modifications. There
was a pair of turrets above the bridge and two extra booms with trawler lines
rigged above the starboard deck. A large crane stood out from the back behind a
lookout tower. The ship was painted a muted gray green, with its name,
Terra Firma
, in thick black letters. A drawing
of black coral spreading in a near-perfect circle was stamped on the side: the
Metal Harvesters’ insignia.